Claimed By The Mafia Don (Ariella and Asher) novel Chapter 449

ARIELLA

I thought of the towel around his waist. Sia standing there in that nightdress. The two of them inside a bedroom..... Inside a bathroom.

Every horrible thought crashed into my mind at once. I took one step back.

"Ariella." His voice was firmer now. "Don't."

He started walking toward me, but I immediately raised my hand.

"Don't come near me."

He stopped.

"I'm warning you," I whispered, my voice shaking. "Don't."

Sia folded her arms across her chest.

"You weren't supposed to find out like this. Those few weeks at the house proved you weren't so bad."

My head snapped toward her.

"You..."

I couldn't even find the words.

She smiled brightly. Not kindly. Like someone who had finally won something she'd been chasing.

"I've been trying to tell you for weeks." She added.

Asher finally looked at her, and the expression on his face made even me take a step back. It wasn't anger. It was rage.

"Sia." His voice was deathly calm. "Get. Out."

She laughed.

"Why? She already knows."

"I said..." His jaw tightened. "...get out."

"I'm not leaving. I've waited years for this. Asher, tell her. Tell her about the agreement. Tell her the truth."

She turned towards me then.

"Asher never wanted you. He married you because...."

"Enough!" Asher's roar shook the entire bathroom.

I had never heard him yell like that before. Even Sia flinched.

"I have never wanted you." Each word came out slow, cold, and Precise. "I have never loved you. I have never touched you. And I never will."

He stared down at her, and Sia cowered away. Asher ground his fists.

"You drugged me, walked into this room after I told you to leave, and you kept coming toward me after I told you not to. If you take one more step toward me..."

His eyes hardened.

"...I don't care whose sister you are..... you'll regret it."

For the first time... I saw uncertainty flicker across Sia's face.

"But the agreement..."

"I burned that agreement the moment I could."

She stared at him.

"You... what?"

"That letter was drafted a decade ago when we were kids. I forgot about it the moment I gave it to you. I should've destroyed it years ago."

She looked genuinely shaken now.

"You lied to me.... You left me on. Why did you let me get close if you didn't want me?"

"No. I never gave you any indication that I had any feelings for you. You let yourself believe whatever fantasy you wanted. But I have never given you hope."

"I have told you no. Again and again." He sighed "It's been years, Sia. I thought you were over the childhood crush. For god's sake, I am fucking married."

Silence filled the room.

Then she looked at me.

"I still would've been a better wife."

That... That was enough.

I walked forward until we were standing face to face.

"I don't hate you," I said quietly. "I pity you."

"It doesn't," he said desperately. "I can assure you I destroyed it immediately. I didn't want you to see it."

"Why, Asher?" I whispered. "Why didn't you want me to see it?"

He rubbed both hands over his face as though his head was splitting apart.

I suddenly thought about the last few days. The nights he hadn't come home, the unanswered phone calls and the silence.

"I have been calling you," I said, my voice beginning to shake. "You haven't been picking up my calls... but you were here doing what?"

I swallowed painfully.

"Sleeping with Sia?"

His entire face twisted in horror.

"No. What? Never. I haven't slept with her."

"Where is your phone? Why aren't you picking up my calls?"

"I don't know where my phone is. I would've picked it up," he answered quickly.

I laughed bitterly.

"We promised not to lie to each other."

He froze.

"We promised to be truthful. We promised to be honest." Tears blurred my vision. "And this whole time you've been lying to me."

"You've been sleeping here. You haven't been coming home." I looked toward the bathroom again. "What are you trying to do, Asher?"

His jaw clenched.

"What are you trying to say?"

I stared at him.

"Is everything Sia told me true?"

"You know that's not true, Ariella." His voice cracked. "Just listen."

But I didn't want to listen, so I turned and ran.